HEADLINES

• Welsh government targets smoking in cars when children present
• Cigarette caused fire at Leicester hospital
• Industrial scale tobacco plot foiled
• Study: Coughing and other respiratory symptoms improve within weeks of smoking cessation
• Study: Smoking tied to higher psoriasis risk
• USA: $300 million trial into the 'reprehensibility' of Philip Morris begins again

• Welsh government targets smoking in cars when children present

  The Welsh government has launched a campaign to stop people smoking in cars when children are present.

  Fresh Start aims to protect children from the effects of secondhand smoke in a confined space.

  The Welsh government has settled on a wait and see approach in the hope that their campaign will prove to be an effective way of cutting smoking rates. An outright ban will be considered depending on the success of the three-year campaign.

  Source: BBC News, 06 February 2012
  Link: http://bbc.in/yYoqAE

• Cigarette caused fire at Leicester hospital

  A patient smoking a cigarette in a hospital bed accidentally started a fire which forced a ward to be evacuated and left three members of staff needing treatment for smoking inhalation following a blaze at Glenfield Hosptial.
  
  Board papers due to be considered at a meeting of directors at the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust reveal that the fire happened in the early hours of December 25 last year on Ward 16 – a ward which cares for patients with respiratory problems.

  Source: thisisleicestershire, 02 February 2012
  Link: http://bit.ly/zofUVU

• Industrial scale tobacco plot foiled

  The leaders of a criminal gang who set up a factory capable of making up to 625 million counterfeit cigarettes and five million pouches of fake hand rolling tobacco a year have been jailed.

  The plot, worth over £131m a year in lost revenue, was foiled when HM Revenue & Customs criminal investigators swooped and closed down the fully equipped cigarette factory in Chesterfield, Derbyshire, before it went into production.

  Source: Wholesale News, 02 February 2012
  Link: http://bit.ly/wUVEcM

• Study: Coughing and other respiratory symptoms improve within weeks of smoking cessation

  According to a new study in Paediatric Allergy, Immunology and Pulmonology, 18 to 24 years olds who stop smoking for at least two weeks report substantially fewer respiratory symptoms, especially coughing.

  Source: Science Blog, 06 February 2012
  Link: http://bit.ly/w0NBLv

• Study: Smoking tied to higher psoriasis risk

  A new study suggests that smokers have an increased risk of developing the chronic skin condition psoriasis.

  People with psoriasis develop thick, red, scaly patches on the skin, which are often itchy or sore.

  Experts believe the disease is caused by an abnormal immune system attack on the body's own cells. Some studies have suggested that smokers are more vulnerable to psoriasis, possibly because the habit can affect immune activity.

  According to the researchers people who were current smokers at the study's start were almost twice as likely as lifelong non-smokers to develop psoriasis. Former smokers had a 39 percent higher risk than non-smokers.

  Source: Reuters News, 02 February 2012
  Link: http://reut.rs/yYZSYi

• USA: $300 million trial into the 'reprehensibility' of Philip Morris begins again

  Ten years after a jury awarded $150 million after finding Philip Morris deceived a low-tar cigarette smoker into thinking she'd chosen a healthier alternative, the case is before a jury again.

  The Oregon Supreme Court overturned the first jury's punitive-damage award because of the way the jury was instructed to deliberate. This time, with a slight but important tweak to the instructions, a new 12-person jury will decide how reprehensible the tobacco maker's actions were in causing the death of Salem resident Michelle Schwarz. The jury can award up to $300 million. Jurors were not told about the original verdict of $150 million.

  Opening statements began in the courtroom of Judge Henry Kantor and the trial is expected to last four weeks.

  Source: Oregan Live, 02 February 2012
  Link: http://bit.ly/zIkLLn